Nagyzee

Very nice collection, I was dreaming about having those Castle and Pirates sets all the time as a kid. (And the early 90s Trains stuff, mainly the Metroliner.) My childhood collection consists of 1x 6074, one basic set and about 8-10 small Impulse sets mostly from City and Castle. My brother had roughly the same. Still, we had lots of fun with it. And Lego was quite a luxury back then over here so we were happy to have as much. I don't know why, but I keep my childhood collection separate from my adult purchases, even from sets from the same era. I guess it's sort of sacred, not to be sold or mixed with other Lego ever. I'd never sell even my least liked set, the 6814 Ice Tunnelator even though I'm totally uninterested in Lego Space. (And wasn't a fan as a kid either.)

I really hope it won't be €50 in Europe, unlike the Stagecoach.

Why is everyone calling the Cavalry set Calvary? Some automatic spell check thing maybe?

According to the Toy Fair pictures and the earlier German catalog scans: Cavalry is 13 USD vs. 15 EUR Comanche Camp is 20 USD vs. 30 EUR Coach is 30 USD vs. 50 EUR Colby City is 50 USD vs 60 EUR Silver Mine is 70 USD vs 80 EUR Train is 100 USD vs 100 EUR Does someone understand the pricing? It is really confusing. Only the Train set conforms to the usual 1 USD = 1 EUR pricing, the rest are even worse, the worst offenders being the Comanche Camp and the Coach. Those latter two price differences are insane. The European price for the Coach is more than double of the US one. I'm not one to usually rant about prices, I do understand the differences that cause TLG to usually calculate retail prices at 1 USD = 1 EUR (main reasons being VAT and economies of scale) but these are unexplainable.

I don't hold my hopes high for an ancient Roman or Greek theme any more. This would have been the perfect time for it when Castle is partly covered by LOTR and they still didn't do it. After this I'd say chances are minimal. It's a bit odd that Playmobil for example has ancient themes all the time while Lego has had none so far. (Closest were the Adventurers and PQ with their Egyptian mummies and architecture.)

I don't find it such a great use to be honest for two reasons: - There is a huge contrast between that one layer of brick bricks and the big smooth panels above them. They don't blend in that nicely. Maybe if the brick bricks were scattered more irregularly. - The brick bricks are not in grey colours so it looks like that the stone castle was built on a foundation of bricks. Which is quite stupid. Btw this theme is quite meh for me. The heraldry is really awful and a huge step backwards. Some of the figs are quite good but he builds are so-so only. The general set-up has been done to death, too. I mean yet again we get a king in his castle with his knights vs. an evil wizard attacking with siege engines from his smaller lair. Couldn't they just think up a slightly different conflict for once?

Very nice. Do you plan to build the other side of it as well? The one facing the main square.

I'm very surprised or should I say shocked that almost nobody seems to be missing the Review Index. I've used that a lot. It was great that I could easily access the reviews grouped by themes. I remember reading almost every single one. I surely wouldn't have done that without the index. Reintroducing it would also be great to see which sets don't have reviews yet and which have only outdated ones (for example reviews where the pictures are no longer available). Also I'd think that was a lot more reasonable amount of work to update than the MOC index. There are a lot fewer new sets and set reviews per year than MOCs.

Or a 2013 Duplo Set. Or a 2013 Bricks and More type set. :) I would have said that sets between 10000 and 10500 are the D2C sets, but the new Arkham Asylum breaks even that pattern.

At least a pinned Set Review Index would be nice.

2008's Cargo Truck was a lot better than this new one. The old Cargo Plane is also somewhat better. The new one has too much white, so the older wins on colour scheme.

No, the dragon is from the Fantasy Era. It's only a placeholder probably but as this is a rather small wave with only one dragon I wouldn't be surprised if they reused the FE dragon molds in the final product as well instead of creating new ones. --- I'll also join the long line of disappointed posters. These sets have too much of the KK feel. The wheels of the siege engines, boring colour choice for the good guys yet again, etc. The crest seems to be closest to the awful Royal Knights one. And the whole stuff has a targeted at 6-8 year olds feel.

Yeah, but it's sort of logical. CUUSOO is sadly simply not for AFOLs. It's for sucking in new audiences by offering a chance to see their obsession / object of fandom / in Lego. That's why it's so lopsided towards projects based on IPs. For example the BTTF set getting the green light was newsworthy on the largest Hungarian news site while I'm 100% sure MWT wouldn't have been at all. At this point I simply don't care for CUUSOO any more. The projects I like most are very far from hitting 10k, and even if they did somehow, I don't believe any more that they'd pass a review. Even if they are not huge so perfectly viable parts-wise and price point-wise they'd probably be shot down based on not enough desirability/marketability in Lego's most important target groups. So why bother?

Do what? The ship is an official model from a set.

I just don't buy into this reasoning that a smaller box was needed to increase desirability for those who do buy boxes (or would buy in the future with the new half size box). Unopened boxes are pretty much unavailable to the average buyer. You don't see unopened boxes on store shelves anywhere.

There is a tender car attached. You can see it flying off at 02:12 Also what would the loco run on if it didn't have the tender car?

You completely missed my point, sorry. I accept the whole one crest / faction solution of LEGO, it absolutely makes sense. I'd never expect them to make significantly more intricate and historic factions as it's indeed a child's toy after all. The historical aspects just came up as I tried to explain why I would like them to not return to previous designs but offering new ones with each new faction or collectible minifigure. So in my opinion: - only one new crest for every new faction = okay - going back to (not so) old designs instead of offering a new one = wasted opportunity

Well, in the high and late middle ages when heraldry really came into notion lesser knights indeed often wore the symbol of their liege lord into battle. But that usually wasn't the king. And that middle "rank" / link is sadly largely missing in LEGO Castle. We got very few lord type figures so far (and none with different heraldry inside a faction). In my ideal Crown Kingdom only the royal guard and the king's other personal forces would sport the crown symbol while other influential families and their retinue of lesser knights would go to war sporting their own symbols. Of course I understand that such a detailed faction will never be made by Lego and I have no problem with that. I'll simply consolidate several Lego factions into one kingdom. I just hope that Lego provides as many separate shield designs over the years and over several themes / runs as possible. So I hope that the speculation above is not true and it won't be Kingdoms that returns, or if it returns then it is at least with two new factions design-wise.

Then buy more. TLG uses only one crest per faction in its usual castle lines anyhow with those being in huge supply so it would be awful if collectible minifigures didn't provide some variation but more of the same.

Might or might not be an intended easter egg because it's a common phrase but when I read: “It’s all in a day’s work for this good knight!” I instantly thought .

What is this fetish with people wanting the same shield design for several figures to make a 'faction'? If there ever is a new Forestmen faction I'd like them to have a different shield than the Forest Maiden's. More variety. And there can be many different shield designs inside a single faction, too. Ever heard of heraldry and how every noble family had different crests? Sure, it's understandable why TLG makes factions have uniform crests (easy identification for kids), but I as an AFOL sure like when we get different designs at least in the CMS. Reusing a CMS shield pattern in a normal line or vice versa is just a wasted opportunity in my opinion. (Like with the S9 Hero Knight figure.)

While the Imperial Flagship has an incredibly misleading name it still is a lot better than the Clipper in my opinion. It just has one of the best colour schemes and nicest sail patterns ever. Also it has a lot better proportions. The Clipper is way too short for its width.

From Wikipedia: A later development of Kálmán Kandó working with both the Ganz works and Societa Italiana Westinghouse, introduced an electro-mechanical converter, allowing the use of three-phase motors powered from single-phase alternating current, thus eliminating the need for two overhead conductor wires.[20] In 1923, the first phase-converter locomotive in Hungary was constructed on the basis of Kandó’s designs and serial production began soon after. The first installation, at 16 kV 50 Hz, was in 1932 on the 56 km section of the Hungarian State Railways between Budapest and Komárom. This proved successful and the electrification was extended to Hegyeshalom in 1934.[21] The electric locomotive on the picture is the first phase-converter locomotive that was built in 1923 and then used for test runs.

This topic is very premature and currently pretty pointless. We've only seen one set so far and the other names are not even coming from an official source but are only speculations. So we know about exactly 1 Hobbit set as of now. Let me think about which of those 1 I'm looking most forward to. Bag End or Bag End? A hard choice but I think I'll go with Bag End. (PS: Sorry for the sarcasm.)

My favourite is the actor by far. The old style diver and conquistador are distant seconds. The latter could have been as awesome as the actor had he been clad in normal armour instead of all this gold. I think Series 8 is a step in the wrong direction. They seem to be on a downhill with regards to creativity though one can't establish a trend on simply one poorer release so there's still hope this was just a one off fluke. Anyhow I really hope that for Series 9 they'll cut down on rehashes and on too close tie-ins to currently running themes and will surprise us with many unique figures (apart from the mandatory boring sportsmen). I also hope that they cut down on speed, releasing 3 series / year is insane and will cause this concept to burn out faster.